


Muffled Gestures

by Higgystar



Category: The Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: Gen, Kinkmeme, M/M, Rickyl, Slow Build, deaf!Daryl, prompts, working up to rickyl
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-03-28
Updated: 2015-11-14
Packaged: 2018-03-19 23:37:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 8,894
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3628494
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Higgystar/pseuds/Higgystar
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Daryl is deaf.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Muffled

He can feel that something is wrong when he enters the edge of camp. It’s not like being deaf had given him superpowers like he’d wished when he was a kid and his hearing had begun to deteriorate, but Merle always told him he was better at sensing shit. So he’s wary when he crosses the threshold of camp and everyone seems to be on edge, watching him, weapons drawn and looking like they’re all ready for a fight.

The corpse of the deer he’d been tracking is collapsed, a huge chunk of its throat torn out and the bolts he’d fired at it still embedded in its flank. He huffs a little and yanks them out, not needing to look as he begins cleaning them off. Daryl is used to doing things without paying attention, it leaves his eyes free to scan the faces of those around him and lip-read what the hell they’re going on about now.

He’s never liked groups. Lots of people meant a lot of talking and if he didn’t know where the conversation was going then he couldn’t always keep up with who was talking or responding and it ended up with him feeling even more of an outcast than usual. But Merle had promised him, finger to his lips before hitting the base of his open palm to his closed fist, that this was just temporary. They were just here for supplies and then they’d leave, with more ammo, more long life food and fuel to keep them going. He wouldn’t have to deal with these people long, but that didn’t mean he didn’t have to suffer through their bullshit for the time being.

So he tries. Daryl watches their faces, focuses on the cop that’s been acting like their leader and noting how he doesn’t seem impressed that he’d bagged them a deer for dinner. The guy seems pissed, but Daryl knows that these assholes can’t read him as well as Merle could, and that meant talking. It’s his least favourite thing in the world, ever since he’d lost his hearing it left him lost as to how loud he was or how his pronunciation was, so he sticks to what he knows. Quiet enough to be heard, angry enough to not coax a real conversation from anybody.

“Cut round it?” He grunts, least he thinks he does. The words scrape against his throat, he can feel the vibrations of his vocal cords but vibrations did shit when your ears didn’t work. Keeping his eyes on the ex-cop he glares a little, ready for the mockery, ready to walk away if he had to. “The messed up part, could cut round it.”

The cop, Shane as Merle had spelt out for him before, shakes his head, his lips move in a small tut or scoff and Daryl knows there’s probably some disgust in the other man’s voice. Still he watches the other man’s lips, takes note of the pops, the flick of a tongue here and there and the way he catches a few glimpses of Shane’s teeth. “I would not risk that.”

And that’s the end of it, there are no more words and Shane isn’t watching him anymore. Daryl has never been good with people, it had hindered his communication for years, but he knows that when people look away it means the end of a conversation. So he feels safe to ignore him, to look around the group and see the reactions of the others around him. People look afraid, the blonde sisters are clinging to each other and he can feel the reason for it sending vibrations through the ground and up through his toes.

A walker head rocks back and forth, snapping at the ground, blood smeared teeth slicing through the air and Daryl can feel every jolt of its movement through the hard soil. He doesn’t bother voicing his opinion that they’re all idiots, instead he merely huffs and shoots the damned thing, yanking out his arrow when the deed is done and stalking off to find Merle.

His arrows get quickly wiped off and clipped back into place on the rack on his bow, out of the way and leaving his hands free to greet his brother. Not that he usually signed out in the open in front of people, this group of idiots didn’t need to know about his disability if he could help it, but right now he just needed to confirmation of Merle’s body heat beneath his palm.

That was the thing about losing his hearing, it made it so much harder to get through to people. He needed his hands to sign, to touch and feel the security of Merle’s warmth in the dead of the night when there was no light to see by. He needed his eyes to read lips, and he needed his other senses to survive before the walkers had shown up. It had been hard, but he’d learnt through trial and error what worked for him and Merle had been his support through all of that.

He’d been young when it had happened. It was gradual, it didn’t hurt and for a while that meant that it hadn’t felt real at all. But within a couple of months after his diagnosis, he’d lost all of his hearing and was suddenly stranded in a world that he didn’t understand anymore. His mother hadn’t lasted long after that, drinking and smoking more often until she just wasn’t there anymore. His father, Daryl may not have been able to hear his shouts of hatred, but it didn’t make them hurt any less.

But then there had been Merle.

His brother had been the rock he’d needed when he’d felt lost, Merle was his anchor in those first few years and he was the person he was today because of him. Merle had kept him from falling into depression and helped him find his feet in the new silent world his life had become. They’d become so much more than brothers to each other, their relationship had only gotten closer, stronger when Merle was his link to the hearing world and could understand him no matter what. At first Daryl had barely left the house, ignoring school and everybody else because it was too damned hard to try and cope with it all. But Merle had helped, shoved him out the door and made him stand on his own two feet.

Sure it had been terrifying. But he had learnt how to lip-read out of necessity. His eyes had learnt where to focus on the lips, which movements made which sounds and how to translate a few movements of the mouth into what he knew were words. Speaking when he couldn’t hear himself was a challenge. Not that he didn’t know how to speak, his mouth and vocal chords remembered all the movements and could go through the motions easily enough, but he still needed Merle there to help him learn what level his voice was on and how he sounded. Not that Merle ever judged him.

That’s the thing with Merle. He’s an asshole sure, but he was there when Daryl had needed him. When speaking had only pissed off their dad when his voice slurred or didn’t hit the letters correctly, Merle had been the one to sit and speak to him, to let him learn how to lip-read better. Merle had been the one to sit with him through the days and let him create his own language with his fingers.

It had been their secret for a while. Not whole sentences, nothing extreme or too complex, but somehow in the stifled heat of their shared bedroom, they’d made their own form of communication. Merle and he had shared their own language, their own code, their own system to understand each other without having to piss off their father. His brother had been there in the dark of the night, when Daryl couldn’t hear Merle’s breathing and instead needed to place a hand on his chest to feel each one of his breaths after a nightmare.

Then Merle had gone and stolen him a book from the library and it was like their secret language evolved almost overnight. The two of them would pour over the book of sign language, each of them reading through the signs, practising them to each other and soon enough learning it all seamlessly. Somehow Daryl’s world got bigger again, even if he and Merle were still the only people he wanted in it, it made his life easier.

His father had still hated him, calling everything under the sun and then some, but he’d gotten through it. He’d survived and heck with Merle’s help he’d practically thrived as well as he was ever going to be able to. They’d made it together, he’d followed Merle’s lead, they’d made their way through life and gotten through it all. Sure their lives weren’t exactly always on the legal side of things, but they got by well enough to survive and that was what it was all about.

Daryl’s communication with other people was always going to be difficult, but he had managed. It had been difficult and he’d never liked having to do it, but trying to sign with other people just felt wrong. Signing was something between just he and Merle, a mix of their own home signs and official ASL becoming their own language and a part of him wanted it to stay that way. Even if it might have made his life easier and would have let more people understand him more, it still felt wrong. So he continued lip reading, he continued speaking when he had to and it just worked for him.

But Merle had always been there as his rock. His big brother was his leader, the one he followed and enjoyed the company of. So if he was more of a loner it was just the way it was, and he was happy with that. Sure his dad had always had issues with him being deaf, but he’d learnt over the years how to survive without his hearing. Hunting hadn’t been hard, it had just meant he needed different tactics and had to adapt the techniques that Merle taught him.

Since he couldn’t hear the wildlife around him he had to be more vigilant and keep an eye out for signs of their presence. He could spot the antler scratches from a buck a mile away, he could see the grazing spots of rabbits without even having to think and footprints and trails were his forte. Daryl knew how to use the wind to cover his scent, he could press a palm to the ground and feel the footsteps of a herd as he watched them through the brush to anticipate their movements.

It was difficult, but he learnt them and he didn’t just get good at it, he got great at it. Sure maybe they were lessons he’d had to learn to survive, but he fucking excelled at hunting and yeah maybe he was kind of proud of that fact. If people ever knew about his lack of hearing, he knew they’d judge him, they’d think him weak or incapable and he’d already proven the world wrong.

So when the walkers came and Merle was grabbing their shit and throwing it in the back of the truck, Daryl was fucking ready. He’d done what he’d always done and adapted as best he could. He’d learnt the scent of the walkers and how to pick it out of the surrounding woodland. Daryl had made sure to get to know the feel of the dragging footsteps of walkers and or course he definitely knew to learn how to take them out. He and Merle had survived together, same as they always had and he could deal with that. No matter what the world threw at them, they’d be ready.

It’s why he’s eager to greet his brother, not only to get away from the group that seem to be watching his every move, but also because he knew Merle would probably have more supplies for them to hide away. It’s not that he wants to screw the group over, he just wants for him and his brother to live and supplies meant survival. Sometimes you had to make choices that didn’t work out for everybody, but life was tough nowadays, or at least as tough as it had always been for the two of them. So he’s looking forward to seeing Merle again, getting to have that one person that he’s always connected with the best by his side again.

The car they’d sent the group out with was missing, but there was a new box truck sitting up the dusty path and a dodge charger that he had to admit looked pretty damned good. It’s rare for his brother to be inside, he and Merle were country boys anyway, but when he notes his brother isn’t around he figures he has to be inside the RV. Banging on the door of the vehicle he calls for him as loud as he normally does, always having hated trying to be loud when he couldn’t hear himself.

Everyone seems to be following him, crowding about the main camp and looking at him as he waits. That makes him feel extremely uncomfortable, and when that new guy gets into his line of sight with Shane, he can see they’re looking nervous or something. Dropping his bow to lean against the wheel of the RV, he moves to grip at the string of squirrels over his shoulder, preparing to drop them too when he notices the motion of Shane’s lips. He’s saying his name, the most familiar of lip movements and it means they’re going to have to have a conversation. Dammit. He’d been looking forward to getting a rest from speaking for a while.

“Daryl, slow up a bit. I need to talk to you.” Shane tells him and as usual the man’s lips tell Daryl his tone. The ex-cop always seems to have a tension when he speaks to him, but today it feels like it’s worse. “It’s about Merle. There was…there was a problem in Atlanta.”

His heart freezes for a second. There is no good news these days and if Shane is looking at him like that then he knows something bad has happened. The mention of his brother’s name makes him dip his head for a second, blinking back the tears already building in his eyes and feeling that hollowness that his father always instilled inside of him. Merle was his backup in this world, the only person that understood him fully and without him, he didn’t even want to think about being without him in this shitty new world they were living in.

People are still around him, surrounding him, making him feel on edge already and he can see Shane’s shuffling feet in his peripheral vision. Fuck, he’s probably missed some more conversation going on when he wasn’t looking but right now it’s hard to concentrate. His vision is fucked, but he tries to concentrate when he looks up and to his surprise it’s the new guy speaking, not Shane.

Daryl can feel that he’s too emotional for this right now. Pacing helps get out the energy but the movement combined with the blurriness of his vision means he can only pick up on a few words from the other man’s lips.

“…danger…brother…handcuffed…roof…still there…”

He can piece together the meaning behind them and it doesn’t make him any calmer. Daryl can’t focus, he can’t think straight, all he can think about is Merle being left, abandoned, up on a roof and just left there. And it doesn’t look like these assholes just rocked up a few minutes ago neither. Fuckers the lot of them, and he wasn’t going to let them just think they could screw over this Dixon too.

The squirrels get thrown at the new guy, he knows Shane is a big fucker and he had far more chance of taking on the new asshole than the ex-cop. So his next move is to tackle him, to take a swing and try to hit him as best he can. He knows he’s crying, probably making pathetic noises for all he knows as he tries to hurt the other man as much as he hurts on the inside. But it seems the other man is ready, and then Shane gets involved when he brings out his knife and before he can get away he’s in a headlock, squirming and gripping at the ex cop’s arm to try and breathe.

Daryl struggles, he pants for air, digs his nails into Shane’s skin to try and hurt him enough to get him to let go. Tears blur his vision, dampening his lashes and coating his cheeks, he can’t help it, losing Merle would screw up his life more than the walkers showing up ever did. He can feel that Shane is talking to him, he can feel his chest vibrating against his back, there are words being said but he can’t see his lips at all. Same with the new guy as he kneels before him, the familiar motions and lip movements are there, but he can’t focus enough to care about what he’s saying. All he knows is that he has to go and find Merle.

The chokehold doesn’t give up and he can barely breathe, each time he takes a breath it feels like it’s going to be his last. Kicking out his legs does nothing, especially not when the new guy grabs them and pins him down even further. He’s trapped, stuck in their grip like an animal in a trap, there until they chose to let him go. It makes him yell out in frustration, not words, but just a noise of pure upset and anger.

A hand is on his face, touching his cheek that’s clammy with shed tears and trying to hold him steady. He struggles, of course he does since being touched is not his favourite thing, but they hold him and restrain him until he’s gazing up at the stranger and Shane’s faces and able to see their lips moving. The grip around his neck loosens a little and when he can breathe a bit easier he realises they actually look kind of worried about him. He hates that, if they really were worried about his well being then they wouldn’t have left Merle on a roof to die.

Merle. He didn’t have time to stick around here, he needed to go and get him.

Scrabbling to his feet he can feel as they get up behind him, and when he snatches up his bow the tension in the air is obvious. But he doesn’t care to look at them and see the way they’re ready for another fight, instead he just starts walking towards the box truck. Wiping his arm over his face he tries to get rid of the tears, sniffing back everything else and trying to focus on what he had to do. He’d never been to the city before, Merle hadn’t wanted him going when he was better off out here in the woodland he could read better and he’d had to agree at the time. But desperate times call for desperate measures.

He’d just have to go in there, right into the heart of the city and go find him. He knew he was on a rooftop and Daryl knew how to be quiet, heck his whole life was fucking silent. Merle would let him know where he was, his brother would find a way to get some sort of signal to him or something. It couldn’t be so hard. The city couldn’t be that bad. It just couldn’t. He could do this.

The feel of feet pounding down the road after him makes him tense, hands automatically going to the hilt of his knife as he turns back around to find Shane and the new guy jogging after him. It makes him even more pissed, because what could they possibly have to fucking say to him right now? Wasn’t this what they wanted? Got rid of one Dixon, now they were going to lose the other. No more Dixons, no more problems.

Shane is yelling, the man is always raising his voice and saying his words with tension, with anger, like he’s pissed off at the damned world. It makes him clench his hands into fists when he sees what he’s saying to him.

“Slow down man, ain’t you listening to us?”

He is more than aware that it’s not Shane’s fault. The other man doesn’t know, heck if he had his way then no one would know, but it doesn’t stop the words from digging into him in such a way that he lashes out again. He doesn’t punch him, but he shoves at him, palms on his chest and putting all his weight behind it until Shane is taking a few steps back. New guy is there with a hand out to him, palm flat and keeping him back, repeating calming words to him like he’s an angry mutt.

It’s too much, all this bullshit building up and up and he just can’t hold on to all this crap anymore. Next thing he knows, he’s talking, not with his voice but with his hands, staring them dead in the eye and letting it all out. Calling them exactly what he wants, his movements harsh and jerky, his version of yelling and he’s sure his facial expression says it all as he signs exactly how much he hates their guts. They’re staring, Shane looking gobsmacked and new guy just looks pissed, at Shane strangely enough.

Daryl knows they can’t understand him, but there is something he needs them to get, so when it comes to his final sentence, he opens his mouth and speaks with his voice alongside his hands. “I can’t listen asshole, I’m deaf.” It’s weird to say it out loud, to feel those words being formed by his finger tapping his upper cheek by his ear and then arcing down to tap beside the corner of his mouth. In a way it’s a huge burden lifted from his shoulders for these people that he’s living with to actually know something so important about him, but mostly it feels like he’s letting out his frustration.

They pause, Shane’s mouth is hanging open making him look like more of an idiot than usual, and new guy still looks a little pissed. He can’t catch everything new guy says when he’s side on and speaking to Shane, but it’s clear when Shane is snapping that he, “didn’t know,” that they’re arguing over his revelation. Rolling his eyes a little he huffs at them, wanting their attention as he tries to get them to stop bickering like a married couple.

“Not a big deal.” He tells them, words and fingers moving, because fuck if they know then he might as well just talk to them openly about it. “Just can’t hear.”

Shane still looks struck dumb, but new guy is nodding to him, turning back to face him and meeting his eyes when he speaks. “We were calling for you to stop. You don’t need to go to Atlanta alone, I’m going with you.” New guy looks damned determined and it throws Daryl for a loop for a second.

“Why?” He signs, and he only realises his mistake when they both look confused as hell and like they want to apologise for not understanding him. Rolling his eyes he repeats himself, this time with his voice.

New guy has his hand on his hips, firm and his lips move in a way that makes Daryl know he’s not going to back down from his choice. “Your brother may be an asshole, but he didn’t deserve to get left up there. It was an accident that he got left behind, and you’re going to need someone to show you where he is.” Noble too. Well he has to admit it would be good to have some back up when going into the unknown.

Nodding in reply he can accept that and maybe this guy cuffed Merle up there, but it doesn’t seem like he meant for him to be left behind. He could deal with that later, right now he needed to get to Merle. Gripping at the strap of his bow he decides to give this a shot, if only because he’d need someone to cover his ass and heck, new guy had gotten himself and the others back here from Atlanta. “Didn’t catch your name.” He points out, watching the other man’s lips closely as he introduces himself for probably the second or so time.

“Rick Grimes.”

Well, hopefully Rick Grimes would be able to keep up with him.


	2. M

He’s had a name sign for Merle since the first day they started learning to sign together. In their shared bedroom, door closed to shut out their parents, they’d sat together, pouring over the stolen book from the library and learning everything they could. They would read together, then try out what they could and practice, testing each other, committing it all to memory and then rehearsing it all over again until it stuck. The first real signs they were confident on were each other’s names.

Thing is, learning to sign hadn’t been an endless list of pictures of people making the signs. There were rules, there were learned behaviours, things people would create on their own to fit their own circumstances that couldn’t be illustrated in a stolen library book. Instead they’d had to read through paragraphs of explanation, learn what the differences were between one handed and two handed signing, make sure to use the correct hand and have their hands facing the correct way to make sense to the viewer and not themselves. It hadn’t been easy, there had been plenty of mistakes along the way, arguments and the book had been thrown at the wall multiple times out of frustration, but they had got there eventually. Together.

Sitting in the back of the box truck, Daryl can feel each and every bump of the wheels over the ground. He could feel the transition from dirt to tarmac, could feel each shift into a different gear by the revs of the engine and even if he couldn’t hear it, he knows he’s the topic of conversation. The Asian kid up front keeps glancing back at him, even if Rick Grimes is in the driver’s seat, he knows he keeps looking in the rear view mirror to watch him. Across from him sits T-Dog, at first Daryl hadn’t been sure why the other guy was coming with them, Merle didn’t exactly keep his racist views to himself. But then there had been an explanation, a slow but certain effort to tell him exactly who had gone and dropped the damned key on that roof and left Merle to his fate. Of course it had pissed him the hell off, made Daryl want to cross the space between them and belt the guy across the face. Instead he’d grit his teeth, pressed back against the side of the truck and kept them all in his field of vision.

His fingers hang between his knees, crossbow to his side, ready to be grabbed if he needs it, but it leaves his hands free to recite the familiar motions. Right hand, little finger folded, thumb tucked to touch his little finger before curling his index, middle and ring finger over it. The letter M made so easily, as familiar to him as breathing, and held over his chest, above his beating heart. It had been so easy to create, for him to immediately assign the gesture to his brother, and for Merle to acknowledge the sign for his name. He doesn’t have any other M’s in his life, and no other people that he wants to assign a name sign over his heart.

It had been natural to have Merle’s name sign over his heart, for him to be the only person Daryl found suitable to be there. Even the signs for mom and dad hadn’t been over his heart, but just the usual, standard signs that everybody else used. Nothing more than labels he used for them, a way to describe what roll they had in his life. But Merle, he had become so much more than the sign for brother, more than just an M, more than any other word he’d read up on and practised until the early morning hours. Merle was worthy of a name sign over his heart, and nothing was going to change that.

In return, Merle had fashioned a name sign for him. Of course it would have been too easy for his brother to similarly sign over his heart, Daryl blames it on Merle being a teen at the time of making the sign, far too arrogant to admit to loving him. Instead Merle had combined the gesture for ‘little’ with the letter D for him. Index finger and thumb of his right hand squeezing together in the gesture for little, before shifting his thumb to press against the tip of his middle finger, raising the index finger straight into the sign for a D. At first Daryl had hated it, hated the way Merle was always emphasising how small he was back then, how he’d always called him baby brother, little brother, anything to remind him of Merle’s superiority. But then when his hearing had continued to decline, and those words started to fade from his memory, he’d found himself strangely comforted by Merle’s created name sign for him. It had helped.

Nowadays, he can’t remember what it was like to hear. Those years of childhood were lost to him, and though he knows at some point he had known what Merle’s voice sounded like, he couldn’t remember. Sometimes he’ll sit beside him, their sides pressed together tight enough that he can feel the vibrations in Merle’s chest when he speaks, but it’s not the same. He’s grateful everyday that they can still talk, that they can still communicate, and that even if he’d never seen anything else through in his entire life, Merle had never given up on learning to sign. It means a lot.

It’s why it hurts so much to think about what they could find in Atlanta.

Merle is a tough son of a bitch, the toughest guy he’s ever known, but that didn’t mean jack shit when you were cuffed to a roof at the end of the world. It makes his stomach clench in worry when he thinks about it, so instead he tries to focus on anything else. Across from him T-Dog shifts, catching his attention and even if Daryl is still pissed at the guy, he still watches through the dim light to read his lips when the other man talks.

“I chained the door to the roof. Walkers can’t get up there.”

Daryl snorts in derision and doesn’t look at the man again for the rest of the ride. Right now he’s not exactly worried about the walkers, he’s worried about everything else. It hadn’t looked like they’d returned from Atlanta a few hours before he’d shown back up at camp, and from what he’d figured out, it had been almost a whole day. A full on day in the Georgia heat, under the sun, through the chill of the night, with no food, no water and no relief. People kept getting so damned sidetracked with the walkers that they forgot about everything else that could kill you. Didn’t need a lot to kill a man. Fact was, you needed nothing at all; mother nature could do it a damned sight quicker if she wanted.

Beneath him he can feel the engine slowing, as they come off the highway and draw in to the outskirts of the city, tyres hitting more potholes, crunching on gravel until idling as Rick begins pulling up. As soon as the vibrations cut out completely Daryl is up on his feet, crossbow slung over his shoulder and fingers yanking the shutter open so he can get out of the damned box truck. He is ready to go, uncaring of the others picking up the bolt cutters and checking their backpacks, wasting time as far as he’s concerned. Right now he needs to get to Merle.

But there is hesitation, he can feel it before anyone even turns his way to try and include him in a conversation. Glenn looks nervous, shifting from foot to foot, fidgeting with his backpack and glancing at him as he runs his tongue over his lips. Honestly, Daryl hasn’t got time for this hesitant bullshit, not when his brother was the one suffering because of it. Still he pauses enough to watch the kid speak, and when he does he thinks he’d probably be justified in punching him. Glenn speaks slowly to him, emphasising every syllable of each word, making his anger rise with each second. “Are. You. Sure. You. Can. Do. This. Dar-ryl?”

Immediately Daryl is stalking forwards to shove at him, trying to get the frustration of the situation out of his body and trying to hold himself back from outright punching the kid in the mouth. Hands are on him in a second, Rick pulling him back, hand to his chest and keeping him from attacking as he barks to the kid. “Don’t do that shit!” He snarls, the upset and worry over Merle combining with his anger, and though he’s not too sure of his volume, he knows he’s not being quiet when he speaks. “I ain’t dumb, just deaf!”

Glenn looks afraid, eyes wide, arms up to defend himself. “I was just…” Daryl watches his lips, sees the way the kid glances down, looks to Rick, and tries to look anywhere but at him when he’s talking. “Trying to make it easier for you.”

Immediately Daryl is bristling in anger, muscles tensing and he can feel Rick’s fingers curl about his bicep, ready to keep him back should he go to attack again. But he knows this is useless, time wasting, and the only one paying for it would be Merle. Instead he snorts, spits at Glenn’s feet and tears himself away from Rick’s grip, feet already moving in the direction of the city before Rick stops him again.

He’s waiting for the cop to yell at him, Rick seems the type to want everyone to play nice, but that’s not going to happen when he’s being treated like this. If there is one thing he hates more than anything, it’s people talking to him like that, like he’s dumb, like he needs their help. It’s why he doesn’t like people knowing, it’s why he lip reads and talks even if he fucking hates it. People didn’t look at him the same once they knew, and he hates it more than anything else. So he’s ready for Rick to do the same, ready to see the other man’s lips move unnaturally slow over words until all the common ticks he knows and can read are lost.

“Daryl, we need to decide how we’re gonna do this.” Rick tells him and for a second Daryl is too shocked by the natural movement to reply. “We need to know what we’re going for first, the guns, or your brother?” There is no slowing of the words, no strange emphasis on each syllable, and no obvious attempt to speak louder like some people thought that would help. Instead, Rick talks to him normally, making eye contact, talking to him straight on, and making things so much easier, if just for a few seconds.

It makes him pause, if just for a moment, because he’d been expecting everything to be different now. But Rick just watches him, waits for him to answer, and isn’t looking at him like he’s incapable. It’s a nice change, he decides if nothing else then the cop deserves his respect for that. So he nods, swallows back the urge to bark at them that Merle should be their first priority, and tries to focus on doing this right. The last escape from Atlanta had been desperate, messy, and dangerous, leaving Merle behind. If it went like that again then who knows what could happen to them all. Better to be smart, to think about it and have a plan of action.

Gesturing to T-Dog and Glenn beside them, he keeps his voice at his usual level, probably quieter than most, but enough to be heard. “Guns.” He nods to them both, two fingers of one hand imitating two people going one way, as he uses two fingers on the other hand to gesture to himself and Rick. “Mer.” Moving his hands apart he tries to get the idea of separating through to them all, two fingers one way, two fingers the other. It’s not technically official ASL, but it’s enough to get the idea through to those not fluent.

Rick pauses, Daryl follows the other man’s eyes as they skate around the group of them, there are a few moments of discussion, one he can’t follow when Glenn and T-Dog aren’t straight on to himself, but he gets the general gist of things. The bolt cutters are handed over to Rick, there is more talking between them, Glenn still not looking his way, but then there is a nod from them all, and Rick is facing him again. “We meet on the ground floor of the building your brother is on in an hour. Then all head out together. Good?” Rick asks him and Daryl appreciates being included in the plan. Nodding he gives his approval, the four of them heading in to Atlanta together to retrieve what they had left behind.

He hasn’t been into the city before now. Merle had pointed out how dangerous it was when the others hadn’t known about him being deaf, and how Daryl had adapted to the woodland but not the urban jungle he’d never been in. With things being so different now with the walkers, it was safer to stick with what he knew, so Merle had gone, and now here they were trying to find him. Each step brings more worry, but he follows Rick, watching as Glenn and T-Dog split away from them into side alleys to find the gun bag, and even if he barely knows the cop before him, Daryl finds he’s beginning to trust him anyway. Maybe it’s because he’d tried for him, made the effort to include him and not immediately shut down the idea of him even coming on this little rescue mission.

Either way, he follows Rick’s lead; he keeps the man before him as they enter the department store, and watches his reactions. Already he can smell walkers inside, not too many, but enough for him to be wary. Crossbow up, he’s already creeping forwards, able to keep Rick in his peripheral vision as he scans the place for the threat. He feels Rick move beside him, can feel the slight shift in the air as the other man tenses, as he sees the walker and braces himself to deal with it. Already Daryl is turning, following Rick’s line of sight until he spots the walker, squeezing the trigger on his crossbow until the bolt flies, hitting the dead bitch right between the eyes. She falls to the ground before them, Daryl moving over to scan the area. Walkers moved in groups, if one had made herself known any others would be soon to follow, but there is no more movement in the shadows, he can’t feel the stumble of their footsteps against the tiled floor so he knows he’s safe to move closer. Snatching the bolt he wipes it off idly, hands working quickly as he keeps checking around himself for anything waiting to catch him off guard. There is nothing there, and soon enough he’s reloading his bow, scowling down to the female walker and idly moving his right hand beneath his nose, crooking his index finger as he draws it across in the sign for ugly.

Turning back to Rick he finds the cop watching him, but it doesn’t make him feel as uncomfortable as when other people do it. Rick wasn’t staring, wasn’t judging him, it just felt like the other man was more observing him, watching him in order to understand him better. It makes him feel a little self conscious, and he’s shaking that feeling away as soon as he can, holding his right hand up, index finger pointing as he shakes it from side to side. Some signs didn’t need explaining, and Daryl is eagerly following Rick when the other man begins leading him towards the stairway, more than happy to show him ‘where’.

They begin the journey upwards with Rick ahead of him, the cop leading the way and scanning each turn for any walkers that may have gotten up this far. But each floor they ascend just brings about more worry, and when the first few are clear of walkers, any fear that Daryl has of being caught by them lifts, leaving him moving faster and ending up in front of Rick as they head further upwards. He’s panting, he can feel each heave of breath in his chest, but even then he’s still calling out, uncaring how he sounds or how loud he’s being as he calls his brother’s name. Daryl knows it’s been years since he’s pronounced his brother’s name correctly, it had always been easier to drop the last syllable, to refer to him simply as Mer when articulating the end of his name became too difficult when he couldn’t hear. At first Merle had protested, but Daryl would give anything to be reminded yet again that his brother’s name had another half to it.

When they reach the door, he finds it chained just as T-Dog had told him, padlocked shut, no way of getting through without the heavy duty bolt cutter they’d bought with them. It’s a small reassurance, but not enough to stop his anxious shifting from foot to foot, almost bouncing on the spot as he waits for Rick to get up the final few stairs. He’s a mix of emotions right now, worry, anxiety, fear, anger, everything all balling into a feeling of unease in his chest. It feels like it takes an age for Rick to cut through the chain, to squeeze the handles of the bolt cutter hard enough to force their way through the metal, snapping the chain and leaving his eager hands yanking it free from the handle, letting it slide to the floor forgotten as he shoves at the door hard enough for it to slam open.

Daryl knows he needs to stay aware of his surroundings to survive nowadays, but right now there is nothing else in the world more important to him. “Mer!” He can’t hear himself, but he knows how he must sound. Emotions are important when signing, the way you sign could affect the understanding just as it did with regular speech, and he knows right now, even if he can’t hear himself, he must sound terrified.

Gravel slides beneath his feet as he tries to get his bearings, calling out for his brother, frantically scanning to rooftop for any sign of him. He’s breathing heavily, panting, afraid, scared, body tense and waiting for answers as Rick reaches out to tap at his arm. Immediately he flinches, never one for contact with anybody other than Merle, but when the other man gestures for him to follow, and begins jogging away from him, Daryl is following. Rick leads him over to the side of the roof, gravel skittering beneath their feet as they move, and Daryl can feel the bubble of emotion caught in his throat when he sees him.

The crossbow falls from his grip, hitting the ground as he sprints forward, uncaring of his weapon, uncaring of how loud he’s yelling his brother’s name as he runs to him. The gravel bites into his knees as he falls to them at Merle’s side, hands automatically grasping at his brother, fingers knotting into the leather of his vest and tugging for a response. He’s still calling out his name, panic making him beg for an answer even if he wouldn’t be able to hear it. Right now there is nothing else in the world but Merle, his unconscious brother still chained to a pipe is the centre of his universe and he can’t help but sob out a noise of relief when he moves. It’s not much, but there is a crease on Merle’s brow, the wrinkle of his nose and he can see a twitch of lips as he tries to find consciousness. He’s alive.

Daryl shakes him harder, hands moving over his chest, mapping out the familiar body that lies beside him and automatically checking for any injuries. Nothing seems out of place, and aside from the red, angry marks around his wrist from the cuff, and the blush of sunburn over his cheeks, Merle looks okay. His hands snake up to his brother’s face, and even if he knows he’s never gonna hear the end of it from Merle after this, he can feel his own cheeks wet with tears. Touch means a lot to him, when one of his senses had abandoned him he’d latched on to the others, and sharing a touch, the feel of skin on skin could mean so many more things to him than it would anybody else. Merle’s skin is warm with fever, the heat exhaustion having escalated without any relief being given, and Daryl knows that even if his brother is here right now, it doesn’t mean he’s safe.

Cupping at Merle’s face he can feel Rick moving around him, the other man getting the bolt cutters to the handcuffs and breaking the connecting chain between them. Daryl knows they don’t want to risk cutting Merle with the jagged edge of a broken cuff, so he’s grateful for Rick’s quick thinking. Still he holds his brother’s face, calling to him, trying to get more of a response from him as Rick moves around him. Even if he knows he should help, Daryl feels unable to, and he’s left sniffing back tears as Rick begins wetting a rag with their water, folding it and placing it upon Merle’s forehead before moving to use the rest of their supplies to help.

Stroking his thumb over Merle’s cheek, he tries to rouse him, even if he can’t hear himself he tries to coax his brother into responding, repeating his name over and over in hopes of an answer. He knows someone losing unconsciousness after heat exhaustion isn’t a good sign, but there was no ambulance to call, no one else coming to help them anymore. Like the rest of their lives, they were on their own.

Except for Rick.

The cop was still there, still wetting rags and pressing them to Merle’s neck, checking his pulse, wrapping the wounds on his injured wrist and sticking by their side when Daryl wasn’t helping at all. Even if there is a lingering sense of anger over Rick being the one who had handcuffed Merle here in the first place, there is also a wave of gratefulness covering it, snuffing it out, because the other man was here and helping now. Rick pauses in his work, probably able to feel his gaze, and looks up to him, meets his eyes and waits for Daryl to scrub at the tears in his eyes, so he can see better, before talking to him.

“We need to get him inside. Out of the heat.” Rick tells him, and of course Daryl knows that’s the best course of action. But Merle wasn’t exactly light, or small, and even between the two of them it would be dangerous to get him down all those stairs. “We need him conscious to do that.”

Daryl agrees, and begins trying anew to get Merle to wake up. Slapping at his brother’s face, shaking him again, calling for an answer until finally he gets more of a response. Sure he can’t hear his brother’s groan, but he can feel it, he knows that look on Merle’s face and he has been there countless times waking up a Merle who didn’t want to be disturbed, and it always resulted in that same look. It takes time, but Merle’s eyes do squint open eventually, peering up at him in confusion with his lips twitching around the familiar word of his name. Daryl can’t hear it, but it’s still the best sound in the world for him. He knows he’s grinning, knows those stupid tears have started again, but at least this time they’re from relief and not fear.

His hands automatically want to begin asking questions; is he okay, can he get up, where does it hurt? But he knows that right now it would be nothing more than a shaky mess of jumbled words and even if he wasn’t so worked up, Merle was certainly not in the position to begin deciphering his sloppy signs. Instead he knots them into Merle’s shirt, clinging to his brother as he finally wakes up, blinking back the confusion and staring up at them both with questions in his eyes.

For what it’s worth, Rick doesn’t seem to hold any grudge against his brother, and the cop automatically begins trying to ease Merle’s head up enough so that he can drink and replenish his fluids. It’s slow going, Daryl watches, his fingers continually stroking patterns through Merle’s vest and shirt, reassuring himself of his brother’s warmth as Rick gets him to drink slowly. It’s not a lot, but Daryl knows they can’t rush it lest Merle just throw up everything he’s drinking, so he’s patient, he lets Merle sip and watches as his eyes become more and more clear with each minute that passes. About a third of the way through the bottle, Rick is touching at his hand, getting his attention before speaking, clearly talking to both of them as he does. “We need to sit you up Merle, nice and slow, rest your weight on us and the pipe.” The cop instructs.

Daryl is instantly helping, at his brother’s side, sliding an arm beneath his neck and letting Merle’s hand grab at his shirt to get an anchorage point. They move slowly together, pausing when Merle needs it, letting him blink away the dizziness until he’s upright, slumped mostly on Daryl and the pipe, but he’s awake and stable at least. It’s a relief, and Daryl lets himself breathe easily for the first time today.

Rick continues helping Merle drink, keeping things at a steady pace as Daryl settles himself to be more comfortable, to be ready to help Merle stand in a minute. As he shifts his boot catches on something, and he can feel it scrape into the floor they’re sitting on, rough and ragged vibrations catching his attention. It’s a saw, one that looks to have fallen from Dale’s tool bag that had also been left up here. That in itself doesn’t interest him, what does is the smear of blood caught on the teeth of the blade.

Immediately he’s snagging Merle’s wrist, the one with the handcuff ring as a new bracelet, and inspecting the raw and clearly sore wounds upon his brother’s skin. Most of them are rough sores, ones created from constant wearing, from Merle trying to ease himself free through a too small hole. But there is one mark, one on the side of his wrist, on the joint where hand becomes arm, a wound that is straight, clearly self inflicted and surrounded by hesitation marks. It makes him feel sick, makes him feel that rush of worry and dread all over again and even if his brother is still recovering, he’s shoving at his side for attention, raising the limb into Merle’s field of vision and raising his free hand up in question.

Merle snickers, and Daryl waits for him to take another swig of water before he’s shaking his hand for emphasis on his question, and what he’s questioning. His brother meets his eyes, and slowly removes his hand from Daryl’s grip, the motions are slow, more sloppy and sluggish that usual, but Merle signs an explanation for him. Each word takes more effort than usual, there are pauses that wouldn’t be there if Merle wasn’t so weak, but Daryl is patient and lets him sign it all out for him.

“Couldn’t. No hand, no sign.”

Daryl doesn’t care if they have Rick as an audience, he wraps his arms around his big brother’s neck and tells him how much that means to him without words, or sign language needed at all.


End file.
